Sandblasting

sandblasting is an industrial technique for cleaning large surfaces using an abrasive sprayed at high speed with compressed air through a nozzle, on the material to be stripped.

When the abrasive consists of balls, we also speak or rather of shot peening.

Sandblasting is used in many industries; it is also a facelifting technique.

The projection of sand at high speed on a surface has several effects:

• It pickles, deoxidizes, removes a fragile surface layer (paint for example).
• It creates a roughness, which facilitates the adhesion of a coating, or gives an aspect to a mold for plastic parts, it is a good preparation before painting.
• It unpolishes, in particular glass, “sandblasted glass” appearance.
• Used for engraving (serial numbers on car windows, names on tombstones).
• When the abrasive is round, like glass beads, a satin effect is obtained. Used as a finish for stainless steel or aluminum welds. This is then called microbillage.
• At high power, the impacts cause plastic deformation and therefore modify the surface (work hardening, creation of compressive stresses, shot peening) Exploded view of a sandblasting gun
  At low power with scrub abrasives, you can clean without damaging the support. (Ex removing paint from a window without roughening or scratching it.)
• Generally, sandblasting induces a surface finish of between 6.3 and 12.5.